


Take No Prisoners

by language_escapes



Series: Chosen and Defined 'Verse [8]
Category: St Trinian's, St Trinian's (2007 2009)
Genre: Gen, Hijinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-02
Updated: 2011-02-02
Packaged: 2017-10-15 07:42:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/158591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/language_escapes/pseuds/language_escapes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Five years ago he went undercover at... <i>that place</i>.  He's suffered severe and recurrent trauma ever since."  What exactly happened to traumatize that man so badly?  St. Trinian's doesn't take lightly to spies in their midst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take No Prisoners

**Author's Note:**

  * For [anonymous_sibyl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymous_sibyl/gifts).



> Includes non-graphic violence. Along the same lines that you'd find within the St. Trinian's films and the cartoons by Searle, but I'm warning for it anyway, just in case. For anonymous_sibyl, who requested hijinks.

“I think Mr. Ansdale is a plant.”

Kelly looks up from her history homework with a raised eyebrow, already incredulous. Polly is standing in front of her bed, hands folded, waiting patiently for whatever Kelly has to say. Kelly appreciates that about Polly; she’s always so willing to wait for her reaction.

“He looks human enough to me,” Kelly says, just to watch Polly turn red.

She doesn’t disappoint. “Not a literal plant, Kelly.”

Kelly grins and closes her history book slowly. Mr. Ansdale’s homework is boring anyway. Polly is so much more interesting.

Most of the school underestimates Polly. She doesn’t look interesting at all. She looks like a boring twelve-year-old Geek, obsessed with computers and anything digital. Kelly knows better, though. Polly is the youngest Geek in St. Trinian’s history- everyone must wait two years before choosing their Clique, but Polly had chosen hers after one- and her Geeky façade hides a wicked sense of humor. In some ways, though, her Geekery is completely genuine. If Polly says Ansdale is a plant, then Ansdale is a plant.

“What do you mean, he’s a plant?” she asks, drawing her legs back. Polly sits down on Kelly’s bed, smoothing her skirt down over her knees carefully.

“I don’t think he’s really a history teacher. I think he’s here to spy on us to the Ministry of Education,” Polly says seriously. Kelly frowns.

“That isn’t good.”

“No,” Polly agrees lightly.

Kelly licks her lips slowly. “I don’t like spies,” she says, and Polly nods.

“No.”

“I think we should do something about it.”

Polly smoothes her skirt carefully, picking a piece of invisible lint off and flicking it away with a disdainful hand before looking back up at Kelly with a broad, dangerous grin. It’s Kelly’s favorite grin. It always promises trouble. “Quite,” she says.

******  
In history class the next day, there is recorded a minor disturbance. It goes something like this:

Chelsea scratches her nose.

Peaches takes offence.

Mr. Ansdale walks between their two desks just as they fling themselves at each other, fingernails flying.

Chelsea and Peaches walk away completely unharmed, giggling and holding hands. Mr. Ansdale somehow comes out with claw marks down his cheeks, shaking.

******  
At hockey practice, things get a little out of hand. No one is quite sure what happens, and when the hockey team is questioned later on, they are reticent and unforthcoming. Nevertheless, somehow the ball winds up in Mr. Ansdale’s office on the second floor, and the entire team follows it and plays the match through on his desk.

Matron sets his broken finger with a tsk and tells him that next time, he should _move_ when the goalie goes to block the forward.

******  
No one expects much from First Years other than pure chaos and violence, but little Celia is such a sweetheart that it’s almost a surprise to hear such a classically cruel idea from her.

“Well, we have the resources,” she says in her whispery thin voice, eyes and smile wide. “And it’s all natural!”

Polly gives her an appraising look and then looks at Kelly, mouthing “Eco,” to her when Celia turns her back. Kelly agrees completely.

And, well, they _do_ have all the resources.

That night, a group of First Years sneak into Mr. Ansdale’s room and slip a sack over his head, tying him up carefully. He struggles, of course, but a grown man is no match for a group of First Years. They take him outside to where Miss Heferton’s Fourth formers have been keeping colonies of fire ants, strip him to his underclothes, and carefully coat him in Miss Heferton’s Upper Sixth formers’ bee’s honey. Then they drop him on the ant colonies and run.

Miss Fritton finds him while walking Mr. Darcy the next morning. She purses his lips and then sighs.

“Really, Mr. Ansdale. I like kink as much as the next person, but there are children here!”

******  
When Mr. Ansdale retreats to his bedroom, he discovers that his bed has been replaced with an Iron Maiden. His screams can be heard even up in the student dorms.

Andrea beams. She was happy to lend hers to the cause.

******  
“This is a crummy party,” Taylor grouses, tossing down her stick and yanking off her blindfold. “The bloody piñata ain’t givin’ no bleedin’ candy.”

Kelly rushes forward, holding out her hands in supplication. “Taylor, I’m sure if you try a few more times-”

Taylor whirls around and glares at Kelly, which stops her dead in her tracks. Taylor has an excellent glare. “No. No, I know I picked out the piñata, but I was wrong. This piñata is rubbish. Tell the birthday girl I’m sorry. I’ll buy her candy from the store myself, because piñata is all dried up.”

Above them, where Mr. Ansdale is tied up as the “piñata,” he whimpers.

******  
Chloe tilts her head to the side as they watch from the window as her family’s mastiffs chase Mr. Ansdale across the school grounds.

“Do you think that what we’re doing is cruel?” she asks to the room at large.

“Yes,” Polly says immediately, carefully recording something in her notebook. Chloe looks at her.

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

Polly shrugs. “He was trying to shut us down. They would have sent us to normal schools. Somehow, that seems crueler.”

They watch as one of the mastiffs latches onto Mr. Ansdale’s bottom.

******  
Anoushka files her nails casually as everyone waits for her report.

“Well?” Kelly demands, finally fed up with waiting.

“A leaky pipe,” Anoushka says, smiling. Kelly stares at her.

“That’s it?”

Anoushka looks up at Kelly and grins wickedly. “Have you ever tried to go about your life with a constant _drip, drip, drip_ by your head? It drips right by his pillow. Not on him, no. But by him. Sometimes it is slow. Sometimes it is fast. He would have to tear apart the ceiling to fix it. He will not be able to do work, he will not be able to concentrate, he will not be able to sleep. It will drive him slowly crazy.”

Kelly nods slowly, and Polly looks up from her computer. “Seems like a variation of Chinese Water Torture.”

Anoushka laughs. “Of course. I am Russian!”

******   
Polly opts for a more psychological version of torture. She gives him flowers and apologies for her classmates’ behavior. She helps him correct homework. She pats his hand while he cries. And tells him that it’s not his fault he’s a bad teacher. That weak people just can’t handle hard jobs. That maybe he’s just not cut out for working at St. Trinian’s.

Before she leaves his office one night, she pauses, turns and asks, “Mr. Ansdale, just a question. Have you considered donating your body to science? Cadavers are so important for the continued education of girls like us.”

When she gets back to the dorms, she offers a small smile to the gathered girls.

“If he lasts one more week, I’ll be shocked.”

******  
In the end, it’s the school play that sends him packing. Really, Kelly is rather surprised by that. She’d thought it would be one of their more dramatic works (they’d planned on dying all his clothes pink and his hair blue next week; the following week they’d planned on liberating a tiger from the zoo, that would have been fun), not the school play.

It goes like this:

The school play is always a parody of St. Trinian’s in some way. This year it’s a murder mystery. The entire school is gathered, either to watch or perform. Mr. Ansdale, twitching and pale, his arm in a cast from when he fell off the roof, is sitting next to Miss Fritton in the front row. In the show itself, Peaches is playing the Head Girl and detective. Chloe is playing Miss Fritton. Chelsea is playing Mr. Ansdale.

Chloe picks up a pen on stage, looks at Chelsea thoughtfully, says, “You always were a ruddy awful teacher,” and stabs Chelsea.

In the audience, Mr. Ansdale turns white, looks at Miss Fritton, stands up and runs screaming out of the hall.

Miss Fritton looks at him go and blinks. “Well, that was uncalled for.”

Either way, it’s a standing ovation all around.

******  
Five years later, Polly is standing before Kelly’s bed again, this time with a self-satisfied smirk on her face that is- well, it isn’t rare if you know Polly, but it still isn’t common.

“I was right about Ansdale being a plant,” she says.

Kelly frowns, and it takes her a moment to remember their old history teacher, the one that they drove to near insanity. She sits up with interest. “Oh?”

“Yes. The new Education Minister, Geoffrey Thwaites, just announced his staff. Alexander Ansdale is part of it.”

Kelly raises an eyebrow and accepts the newspaper that Polly is holding out to her. She reads the article quickly and then looks back up at Polly. She’s practically thrumming with excitement, which _is_ unusual.

“Thwaites. He’s the one who likes to go to the worst institutions, right? Fix them up, get them in line?”

“Right,” Polly affirms, and Kelly grins slowly.

“So he’ll be coming here.”

“Right,” Polly says.

“Wonder what Ansdale will have to say about that.”

Polly’s grin is broad, dangerous. It’s Kelly’s favorite. It promises trouble.

“Quite.”


End file.
